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Pugh, Golding and Bamforth star for Titans

VALE swimmers helped Ellesmere College Titans to one of their best results at the Swansea level one open meeting.

The Shropshire outfit were voted top club with more than 100 medals, including 55 golds, 31 silvers and 18 bronzes.

Titans broke 49 meet records together with 22 club records and they registered plenty of personal bests.

Stunning displays came from the younger swimmers with Pershore 14-year-old Tazmin Pugh climbing on to the top step of the podium in each of her events.

Pugh converted her last remaining short-course national qualification time to the preferred long-course standard in the 100m backstroke, taking gold in one minute eight seconds.

She then achieved her 10th national age group championships qualification time with 1.00.82 in the 100m freestyle.

Other golds came in the 800m freestyle (9.05.41 meet record and second in the United Kingdom end-of-year rankings), 400m individual medley (5.00.85 meet record and second in UK), 100m butterfly (1.03.78 and first in UK) and 200m individual medley (2.25.46 and fifth in UK).

Several times, Pugh’s team-mates recorded the top three podium places in the same event.

Ellesmere year 11 pupil Chloe Golding, 15, won four golds with a meet record coming in the 100m backstroke with 1.04.95.

Although not a pb, so much was the Evesham teenager's dominance in the event she still broke the meet record in the 200m backstroke (2.18.73).

A pb in the 100m butterfly of 1.04.73 proved she was on song.

In the concluding event, the 15 and over skins, eight swimmers started with the order for the stroke drawn at the start of each round and the slowest eliminated each time.

With luck on her side, backstroke was drawn four times in a row and Golding went on to win the £75 prize. Year nine pupil Harry Bamforth, 13, took bronze with a new eight-second pb in the 1,500m freestyle (17.49.34) and also the 400m individual medley (5.21.87).

Other pbs came for the Vale teenager in the 100m freestyle (1.01.91), 200m backstroke (2.27.70) and 100m butterfly (1.11.53).

Bamforth will hope to improve on his 1,500m time further to achieve a national qualifying standard.

Being in the three Titans’ 14 and under relay teams, he should represent them at the nationals anyway.

Bamforth heads to the Midland Age Group Championships this weekend where 18 Ellesmere swimmers have qualified.

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